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On Freemasonry. The Spurious Freemasonry Of Ancient Times,
Ante mare et tellus , & c . Before the seas aud this terrestrial ball , And Heaven ' s high canopy , that covers all , One was the face of nature , if a face ; Bather a rude and indigested mass ; A lifeless lump , unfashioned and unframed ,
Of jarring seeds ; and justly Chaos named . No certain form on any was impiess'd , All were confused , and each disturbed the rest . For hot and cold were in one body fixed ; And soft with hard , and light with heavy mixed . But God , or Nature , while they thus contend , To these intestine discords put an end ; Then earth from air , and seas from earth were driven , And grosser air sunk from ethereal Heaven . DBYDBN
These brief extracts from the esoteric lectures of the various systems of ancient nations , constitute an undeniable evidence that a confused tradition of this august event , had been carried , along with the spurious Freemasonry , from Shinar , by the wandering tribes , and scattered over the world in a shape which , amidst all the conflicting jargon of
various and irreconcilable mythologies , retained evident tokens of its origin , in the character of its legend , and the uniformity of its symbols . There was a very significant ceremony common to the mysteries of all nations , which possessed a direct reference to the subject now under consideration . The candidate
, that he mi ght the more aptly represent the Deity amidst Chaos , like the Indian Brahma , was made to descend into a place of DARKNESS ; and there being deposited in the pastes , he was enclosed , like the yoke within an egg ; and left , without the means of extricating himself , to his own reflectionsin a state resembling absorptionfor a prescribed
, , period of time , which differed in different nations . This was the aphanism . Subsequently , he was liberated , and raised , to a state of LIGHT and knowledge amidst a general rejoicing . This was the EURESIS . A rite thus striking and universal must have possessed some extensive reference ; and accordinglwe find that the primary intention was to
y pourtray the darkness of Chaos ; although it had an ultimate application to death , resurrection , and a future state , figured by the symbols of honey , a sprig of cypress , and a swarm of bees . For these reasons Darkness occupied a large space in the
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
On Freemasonry. The Spurious Freemasonry Of Ancient Times,
Ante mare et tellus , & c . Before the seas aud this terrestrial ball , And Heaven ' s high canopy , that covers all , One was the face of nature , if a face ; Bather a rude and indigested mass ; A lifeless lump , unfashioned and unframed ,
Of jarring seeds ; and justly Chaos named . No certain form on any was impiess'd , All were confused , and each disturbed the rest . For hot and cold were in one body fixed ; And soft with hard , and light with heavy mixed . But God , or Nature , while they thus contend , To these intestine discords put an end ; Then earth from air , and seas from earth were driven , And grosser air sunk from ethereal Heaven . DBYDBN
These brief extracts from the esoteric lectures of the various systems of ancient nations , constitute an undeniable evidence that a confused tradition of this august event , had been carried , along with the spurious Freemasonry , from Shinar , by the wandering tribes , and scattered over the world in a shape which , amidst all the conflicting jargon of
various and irreconcilable mythologies , retained evident tokens of its origin , in the character of its legend , and the uniformity of its symbols . There was a very significant ceremony common to the mysteries of all nations , which possessed a direct reference to the subject now under consideration . The candidate
, that he mi ght the more aptly represent the Deity amidst Chaos , like the Indian Brahma , was made to descend into a place of DARKNESS ; and there being deposited in the pastes , he was enclosed , like the yoke within an egg ; and left , without the means of extricating himself , to his own reflectionsin a state resembling absorptionfor a prescribed
, , period of time , which differed in different nations . This was the aphanism . Subsequently , he was liberated , and raised , to a state of LIGHT and knowledge amidst a general rejoicing . This was the EURESIS . A rite thus striking and universal must have possessed some extensive reference ; and accordinglwe find that the primary intention was to
y pourtray the darkness of Chaos ; although it had an ultimate application to death , resurrection , and a future state , figured by the symbols of honey , a sprig of cypress , and a swarm of bees . For these reasons Darkness occupied a large space in the